UV and Material question

Development Asset Creation
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1

So, I am trying to figure out a good way to be efficient with models/textures/materials. I have seen so opinions go either way, so I’ll ask here directly.

Is it better to have a smaller material with the texture space being for 1 mesh only, or a larger material that can be used on several meshes?

The example I’ll use is a -sword blade-. Larger material that has multiple sword blades on 1 texture. Sword 1 2 and 3. The UV for Sword1 would go on Sword1, UV for Sword2 would go on Sword2 and so on. This leaves a lot of unused UV space in the material, but I’ve read that having less materials is a good thing. It would only have to load the material 1 time for each sword, instead of having to load several smaller materials.

Is this a good idea or just a waste of resources? Still learning… Any help would be greatly appreciated. If I screwed up my explanation I can try to clarify.

2

That can help, but the biggest issue is using multiple materials on a single mesh, like if you originally had a metal material for the blade and a wood material for the handle then you would reduce draw calls by making them into one material.

3

Ah. Well what I’m working on right now is interchangeable parts, like in a shooter where you pick scope/barrel/stock etc… except for swords. Was going to do the same for blade and hilt. Could potentially have dozens of sword combinations with the same 2 materials. Is that crazy/wrong?